Tag Archives: plastic waste

The Cost of Christmas

“Tis the season for excitement and excess… and while our waist lines and bank balances may bear the brunt of our festive good cheer, the oceans suffer too.

Every year Australians spend more than $16 billion celebrating Christmas (which is almost $1,000 per adult!) – half of that goes on gifts.

The vast majority of presents come shrouded in plastic –  the enemy of all things marine.

In Britain alone, 125,000 tonnes of packaging is purchased at Christmas – multiply that by all the other countries who have also bought into the December consumer frenzy and that’s a whole lot of waste that needs to be dealt with.

When it comes to gifts, ideally we should embrace the idea of experiences over physical items – a ticket to a Marine Biologist for a Day Program run by Ocean Life Education will be remembered long after the holidays have passed!

Likewise, donating to your favourite charity – be it humanitarian or conservation will help improve the balance on this planet.

But if products need to be bought, how the packaging is disposed of becomes paramount – artificial floating debris gets ingested by curious marine life making it the scourge of the sea.

Most plastics and cardboard can be recycled – but not the polystyrene foam often used to protect electronic presents.

The paper the gift comes wrapped in also takes a massive toll on nature – it’s estimated 50,000 trees are harvested every year in Australia just to produce the colourful embellishment that is ripped and discarded within seconds of reaching its recipients.

Paper is a preferable choice to foil but a better option is to use homemade wrapping created from recycled material or reusable presentation boxes.

Batteries too have become a major headache for the environment – 8,000 tonnes of them are thrown away in Australia every year.  Switching to rechargeable options has a third less impact on the planet.

Ocean Life Education has a range of programs that help to inform people of all ages about ways to be more mindful of our footprint on earth – our mobile aquarium can come to you for all sorts of occasions, giving the gift of interacting with our beautiful marine animals.

Being conservation minded in the festive season is not about sucking the joy out of Christmas – it’s about finding a way to celebrate that doesn’t cost the earth it’s future.

Choose to refuse plastic in July

Choose to Refuse Plastic Free July

July is ‘Plastic Free July’

Did you know Australians use around 100 kilograms of plastic packaging per household each year? Choose to refuse single use plastic this July by signing up for the Plastic Free July challenge at www.plasticfreejuly.org. You will receive tips and support through a weekly e-newsletter during the month and you won’t be alone. You’ll be joining a million+ people world-wide in making a difference.

It is so simple to be part of Plastic Free July. Firstly, remember your reusables! Being plastic free means you always need your trusty reusable water bottles, reusable coffee cups and reusable bags handy.

Secondly, spread the word – grab your friends or co-workers and spread the plastic free love.

Go plastic free and make a differenceplastic-free-july-logo-straight-lge

The more people that choose to refuse, the greater impact we can make in reducing landfill and saving our oceans! We encourage you to help people share the challenge in your workplace, community, school and other groups.

What can you do?

From hosting a plastic free morning tea to giving your local cafe posters to encourage reusable coffee cups there are lots of materials to share and are all free to use.

Here’s some ideas we put together specifically for schools and childcare centres:

  • Plastic free morning tea: Use it as a healthy and fun way to introduce children to the problems of single-use plastic in an easy way. Plan a plastic free morning tea
  • Plastic free living workshops: give children and people skills and alternatives to plastic. This could be sewing reusable bags or making preserves. Plan a plastic free workshop
  • Bid Audit – what’s in your bin? A bin audit is a great way to see how much plastic you dispose in your school or workplace. You can opt for a comprehensive audit, weighing all the rubbish or go for a simple audit and just count the number of plastic items.
  • Have a school cleanup day: cleanup the school grounds or surrounding areas and work on ways to target plastic litter.
  • Have a ‘nude food’ day: nude food lunch days are days when students (and parents!) try their best to pack a lunch box without single-use disposable plastic.
  • Start a plastic free initiative. Get inspired by these great case studies.
  • Encourage others to refuse plastic: share these freely available posters & flyers with your local cafe, school or group to encourage people to use reusable coffee cups and bags.

All the tools and resources you need for your Plastic Free July are at www.plasticfreejuly.org.

Share with us

We’d love to see what your doing in your Plastic Free July. Post your pics on Facebook and tag @oceanlifeeducation so we can share them and inspire others to go plastic free. Let’s all do our bit to keep our waterways and oceans plastic free!